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Saturday, March 9, 2013

Fearless Females - Sisters from Hungary

New York Passenger Lists

SS Aquatania sailing from Southampton

Arriving New York 9 Dec 1921

Lines 21, 22, 23 show the arrival of three sisters from Hungary. Juliana 20, Mary 16, and Elizabeth 12, had traveled from Szabolcs Megye Nagy, Apagy, Hungary to come to the new world. It must have been a terrible crossing, the page shows that many people had been in the hospital, some even died. Mary was one of those hospitalized, so ill that she refused to even think about another sea voyage ever again. The ship log shows that they had been living with their brother Peter Fendrik in Apagy until their voyage to America. It was very scary for the three girls who spoke no English. They were going to Rayland, Ohio which may have been the home of their mother Elizabeth who came to America about 1914. They hadn't seen their mother in seven years and now she was married with another child.

This is not Mary's entire story. It does not relate how she immediately went into service in a private home and learned English by immersion. She married a coal miner and lived her live in Martins Ferry, Ohio raising three children and practicing her faith. Although she was a small woman, she was four feet nine inches in height, Mary was a giant in the kitchen. Mary's baking skills were legendary and were in high demand. She baked for family and friends often donating to church dinners, and funeral luncheons.

Mary Fendrik Gulyban was my father-in-law's mother. From her I learned to make stuffed cabbage rolls. and her wonderful Hungarian Kolaches filled with apricots, nutmeats, and poppy seeds.